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Guest Post by John Mac Ghlionn

Millions of Americans celebrated the idea of ‘Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness’ this past July 4th — but millions of Americans didn’t. Across the country, a growing number of individuals, particularly young men, are walling themselves off from society. The question, though, is why?

In Japan, the issue of social withdrawal is so severe that the Japanese even have a specific term for it: hikikomori. Hiki means “to withdraw,” komori “to remain inside.” It is estimated that at least 1.5 million Japanese people, many of whom are young men in their 20s and 30s, have completely withdrawn from broader society.

Some 6,000 miles away, in the U.S., young men are also retreating en masse. They stubbornly refuse to cooperate or engage with other members of society. This is a growing problem, one that must be addressed sooner rather than later. America has its own hikikomori problem.

As the political economist Nicolas Eberstadt recently warned, a shocking 7 million prime working-age men ( ages 25-54) are jobless. Worse still, they have absolutely no interest in finding work. In other words, enough men to populate the country of Paraguay simply refuse to work.

What do these jobless, unmotivated men do with their free time? As Eberstadt noted, these sad souls spend at least 2,000 hours each year glued to screens. The average American employee spends roughly the same amount of time working.

These men rarely interact with the outside world. Instead, they spend most of their time playing video games, watching porn, smoking weed, and popping painkillers, according to Eberstadt. What is going on? Who is to blame for the demise of American men?

The answer is a long one. For years, various institutions, including the medical establishment, the mainstream media, and the education sector, have waged war on the men of America. They have pushed to ‘redefine’ the concept of masculinity. In a recent piece for Psychology Today, Preston Ni decried the “prevalent gender expectations imposed on boys and young men.” He criticized members of society for encouraging boys and men “to embrace traditionally masculine qualities.” Why, he asked, are males expected to be “strong, tough, self-reliant, and dominant in various aspects of life.” The “pursuit of physical and sexual prowess, financial success, and the acquisition of power and status,” he added, should not “become benchmarks of male achievement, This type of social conditioning, he warned, is extremely harmful.

Is it, though? It’s a very different type of social condition that should concern us, I suggest.

There is a concerted effort to eradicate many of the attributes and behaviors commonly associated with healthy males: competitiveness, strength, courage, leadership, and assertiveness. In this post-Harvey Weinstein world, masculinity is now considered ‘toxic,’ a virus that requires a powerful vaccine.

If in doubt, let me point you in the direction of the education system, where guardians of our children are being taught how to identify and destroy traditionally masculine qualities. In a push for greater gender equality, teachers are being asked to promote something called ‘positive masculinity.’ If toxic masculinity involves bravery and strength, one needn’t possess more than a few working neurons to figure out what positive masculinity entails. What we are witnessing is emasculation en masse, a sort of psychological castration.

Of course, it’s not just the education system that’s busy performing laminectomies on our young men. The mainstream media is also on a mission to reduce the effects of ‘extreme masculinity’. The New York Times recently published a piece on the search for ‘non-toxic manhood.’ The Washington Post, meanwhile, blames toxic masculinity for the rise in male suicides.

Is a strong, courageous man more likely to kill himself than a weak, spineless one? I’ll let you answer that question for yourself.

On TV and in movies, the strong, independent man has been replaced by the strong, independent woman. The Boss Bro has been replaced by the Boss Bitch. An increasing number of once formidable male characters have been reduced to pathetic caricatures. Again, if in doubt, let me point you in the direction of “Thor: Love and Thunder”, one of the biggest movies of 2022. In it, Thor, a god associated with power and virility, finds himself the butt of female-perpetrated jokes. For a big, fat paycheck, Chris Hemsworth allowed himself to be publicly humiliated. The year before, in “No Time to Die”, we witnessed the emasculation of James Bond.

Contrary to popular, unscientific belief, males and females are not the same. There are a number of sex differences in brain anatomy. Moreover, men are, on the whole, judged much more harshly than women. Andrew Tate, the much-maligned influencer, famously said that “women are, and men must become.” In other words, in order to become successful, to become something of value, all men must battle various hardships. They must undergo a multi-stage lifecycle. Encountering and overcoming adversity is not just advisable, it’s necessary. Tate is right. A 300 pound woman will always find some poor sucker to wife her up. A 300 pound man, on the other hand, will almost definitely die alone, drowning in a sea of blubber, sweat, and tears.

There is no place in the world for average men. The same is not true for women. Yet the country is full of average (and below average men), many of whom have been socially conditioned to behave in very particular ways. Their spines have been removed.

Today, the men of America are just as likely as women to cry in public. This is not something to be celebrated. Encouraging males to cry without offering any solutions to their problems creates weaker individuals, not stronger ones. We need soldiers, not soft, soppy souls. We need more alpha males, not more betas.

The men of America are in a dire state. An increasing number of young boys are experiencing gender dysphoria. Ask yourself, why is this the case?

Could it have anything to do with a comprehensive push to rid society of every traditionally masculine quality imaginable?

John Mac Ghlionn is a psychosocial researcher and essayist. His work has been published by the New York Post, The Sun, The Sydney Morning Herald, Newsweek, Unherd, and The Spectator US, among others. Follow him on Twitter, @ghlionn.

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